Nationals continue to roll with win over Cardinals

May 26, 2007 - 5:30 AM
ST. LOUIS (Ticker) -- The Washington Nationals continue to play
their best baseball of the season.

Brian Schneider hit a two-run homer and Nook Logan drove in a
pair of runs as the Nationals defeated the St. Louis Cardinals,
5-4, in Friday's opener of a three-game series.

Cristian Guzman also drove in a run for the Nationals, who have
won four in a row and 11 of 15 after winning just nine of their
first 34 games.

"It was an all-around good baseball game," Schneider said. "The
fans got their money's worth tonight. It wasn't just on our
side. They made some great plays too. It was just an exciting
game tonight. We said that we need to play team baseball and
tonight was a fun game."

Schneider cracked a 1-1 pitch from St. Louis starter Anthony
Reyes over the wall in right for his third home run of the year
and a 2-0 lead in the second inning. Logan kept the inning
going with a double and moved to third on a single by pitcher
Micah Bowie. Felipe Lopez walked before Guzman hit a sacrifice
fly for the third run of the frame. Reyes struck out Ryan
Zimmerman to end the inning.

Bowie (1-2) picked up his first victory of the season, allowing
two runs, four hits and a walk while striking out two in five
innings. It was just the second start of the season for the
lefthander after 20 appearances out of the Nationals' bullpen
this year.

Five relievers bridged the way to Chad Cordero, who pitched the
ninth for his seventh save of the season.

Reyes (0-8) continued to struggle, allowing five runs, eight
hits and five walks while striking out four in 5 2/3 innings.
The Cardinals have lost all nine games started by the
righthander, whose last win came in Game One of the World Series
in October.

"I can't be walking guys," Reyes said. "That's one of the
things that has hurt me. They get on base and then they get
those hits. It's stuff that I have to fix. On the home run
pitch I was trying to throw a sinker and it just didn't do
anything and just stayed in the middle."

Albert Pujols and Jim Edmonds each hit a solo homer for St.Louis
in the fourth to cut the lead to 3-2. It was the eighth
longball of the season for Pujols, who had 23 home runs through
May 25 last season.

A two-out, two-run, ground-rule double by Logan in the sixth
inning padded the Nationals' lead.

The Cardinals threatened in the sixth with runners on first and
second and one out, but Austin Kearns turned in the defensive
play of the game to end the threat. The right fielder made a
spectacular diving catch to rob Edmonds of a hit and then threw
to first base to double off Scott Rolen and end the inning.

"That's the way it goes," Pujols said. "That's why this game is
so interesting. Every day you come you learn something new. How
many times is Austin Kearns going to make that play?"

Bowie said the Nationals' defense was key in the win.

"It's an incredible feeling," Bowie said. "The guys played hard
and did a great job defensively. I'm glad that we could pick
up a win out of it. It fires you up. It pumps you up on the
mound. When guys are going out there making plays like that and
doing things like that. I don't know if you can go any harder
than you already go but you definitely want to make pitches
because your teammates are going hard."

The Nationals escaped trouble again in the eighth.

Rolen's RBI single off Jon Rauch with no outs cut the lead to
5-4 and put runners on first and second. However, Jesus Colome
entered and prevented further damage by striking out Edmonds and
getting Yadier Molina to ground into a double play.

"What (Colome) just did tonight, amazing man," Schneider said.
"Exactly what we need him to do. To strike out Edmonds was
huge. That set the tone and allowed for the double play to
happen. That might be player of the game, honestly."

Molina was held hitless, bringing his 15-game hitting streak to
an end. It was the team's longest hitting streak since Pujols'
17-game run in 2005.